July 2000 Winner The Eraserhead Award For Disturbing Behaviour | the real or hardly alarming stalker enigma letter one | letter two | answer

Dear Lady in Red, I am sorry to keep calling you this but I do not know your name. I am writing to you because I feel that there are things that I want to say to you and I am not at Bunkers Hill to talk to you. Firstly, since my job went wrong and became unemployed I have been very ill mentally and my life is badly ruined. I do like my beer these days and am not able to become "tea-total". My average beer consumption per week is about 25-30 pints - but this can include orange squash if I am in some pubs. Now I have only been smoking 1 year because of depression and I am trying to stop or slow down a lot. I really do not want hangovers because of big cigar smoking and I have noticed recently that my leg muscles tighten up after I have done quite a bit of smoking and I become lame. Because of the length of time I have been unemployed I have slowly run up credit card debt in order to enjoy myself a bit and after 4 years it mounts up. I am sorry to have to tell you this but I earned £100 extra each week which after 4 years is £21,000 which is seven times what I owe. Please do not blame me for this it has not been easy these last 4 years and things are getting worse. The other problem with not working is the sheer boredom which I suffer from and it is very unpleasant. I really am quite a nice person and I hardly swore until things went badly wrong. I used to be active doing cycle touring, walking and youth hostel traveling. I used to take slide photographs and build model ships. I do not know when I shall see you again because I have no money at the moment and cannot go out much. I wish that I could work with you it would be better than being bored. I am not sure whether I can say I love you or not but I know about a week ago I felt funny. Another thing that concerns me is that should we eventually get together I really am not sure how good my virility is, but I only hope that if love does eventually work, then I hope not to have anything to worry about. I did wonder, since I am short of money whether you may wish to visit me at the address on the front page. There are some woods not far away and the view across the hills is splendid. I hope that you do not mind me writing to you. If you were to visit me you would need to catch a No 24, 25, 26, or 27 outside Dixons at Victoria Centre and get off at the Westdale Tavern. Actually this is my mother's house and it is behind some garages. At least you know where I live. Perhaps you will write to me? Love Trevor